South Africa after the elections

Udo W. Froese  Africa the Other Side of the Coin SOUTH
Africa’s elections will be a mere earth-tremor in its preparations for the earthquake of the real political power strategies and struggles leading up to the elections in 2019. After the May elections, new political party alliances will be formed. The goal is a complete political transformation. The following is an unscientific but strategic pattern analysis, not popular within the country’s corporate media monopoly and with its armchair academic analysts.

Since 1999, the former Bantustan Transkei military leader, General Bantu Holomisa, has been preaching the formation of an opposition alliance to challenge the ruling ANC.

When the breakaway party, the Congress of the People (COPE), split into two after the fallout between COPE’s leaders, Mosiuoa Terror Lekota and Sam Shilowa, the new breakaway joined General Holomisa’s United Democratic Movement. Homolisa stated then: “This is just the first manifestation of a black- dominated coalition.”  Under the late president Nelson Mandela, Holomisa served as a deputy minister of tourism. Soon he fell out with the ruling African National Congress. He then formed a new political party with the former apartheid minister of defence, Roelf Meyer. But, he soon opted out of the alliance with Holomisa.

The question that arises is: Is Gen. Holomisa the dark horse in the elections? When will a new alliance between his UDM and COPE-2, AMCU, possibly a breakaway from NUMSA and Agang SA, be formed? It could be the reason for Holomisa having met with the Association of Mine and Construction Workers Union (AMCU) on numerous occasions.

Like Holomisa, the National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa’s (NUMSA) secretary-general, Irvine Jim, also hails from the Eastern Cape. A host of small political parties on the fringe would join the new alliance Holomisa lobbies towards.

Agang SA’s Mamphela Ramphele has no hope at all of leading any black South African party of note, not to mention becoming the president of the country. She is just too erudite, with no foot on the ground, accused of being unable to complete anything she touches.

The difference between Holomisa and Ramphele is quite obvious. Despite having been a former bantustan military leader, Holomisa remains hands-on and therefore, relevant to local politics. He is respected in the Eastern Cape and has earned his stars. Unlike the elitist Ramphele, boots-on-the-ground Holomisa is not just an airy-fairy token for many well-heeled international Western interest groups.

The DA would seem to go it alone until 2019. It would continue with its strategic efforts to weaken the ANC. By its own admission, the DA plans to take over the Union Buildings in Pretoria as the new ruling party. However, it seems that the DA has also realised that it might not quite make it alone. Therefore, the new DA strategy seems to be to attempt a coalition agreement with the ANC by 2019.

A long-serving, senior member of COSATU’s leadership explained: “The DA and its backers seem to work on a group of COSATU affiliates. Those could include the South African Municipal Workers Union (SAMWU), the Food and Allied Workers Union (FAWU), the Chemical Workers Union (CWU), and regional representations of the South African Democratic Teachers Union (SADTU), excluding its headquarters.”

The role and the timing of Julius Malema’s Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) seem to depend on its current leader’s situation. The question mark over Malema’s political future and his leadership of the EFF will be addressed if a provisional sequestration order is finalised. Malema would see his political aspirations for a seat in Parliament evaporate, as being an unrehabilitated insolvent would prevent him from being a member of the National Assembly. Malema would just be dumped then, and Dali Mpofu would quickly take over leadership of the EFF.

The new executive of the emerging political alliance possibly led by Bantu Holomisa would show its hand. Would the disgraced, former COSATU general secretary, Zwelinzima Vavi become the shadow economic minister then? Would the likes of the AMCU head, Joseph Matunjwa, NUMSA secretary general Irvine Jim, Agang SA leader Mamphela Ramphele, and the possibly new head of the EFF, Dali Mpofu, be part of the new executive? If that was the case, could one assume that the AmaXhosa’s attempt to get back into national power would be realised?- NewAfrican